


My perfect cannibal

by the_silent_sea



Category: Criminal Minds, Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Cannibalism, Gen, Tetchiness due to constant kidnapping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-05
Updated: 2014-02-05
Packaged: 2018-01-11 06:28:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1169786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_silent_sea/pseuds/the_silent_sea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the wake of the whole Hannibal Lecter thing, Reid had begun to expect a certain standard from his kidnappers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	My perfect cannibal

**Author's Note:**

> Theme music: Come into my Dreamland by Ed Harcourt (from Time of Dust, 2014)

Reid had been kidnapped.

Again.

He was strapped to a rickety chair (again); chained to a floor running with foul-smelling black water (again); handcuffed to a rotting table (again).

After a certain point it just got tiresome.

“Eat! Eat!” wheezed the swivel-eyed, psychotic, serial-killing, cannibalistic weirdo and waved the gun around vaguely to encourage Reid.

Reid made a noise of irritation and looked at his plate. He counted three ears, eight and a half fingers, a toe-nail, two noses and four body parts best described as coming under the heading of you-don’t-want-to-know. “This is a pink plastic picnic fork,” he said with some asperity. “How exactly am I supposed to eat fingers with a pink plastic picnic fork?”

The swivel-eyed, psychotic, serial-killing, cannibalistic weirdo grinned and sucked in air noisily through brown and crenellated teeth.

Reid waited until it became clear he wasn’t going to get any other reply. “Fine,” he sighed.“But those?” He pointed with the pink plastic picnic fork to the you-don’t-want-to-know body parts. “Those are disgusting. I’m not touching them. I don’t care what you do. It’s not going to happen. Not to mention some of these fingers aren’t properly cooked. Do you know how many diseases you can get from eating improperly cooked human fingers? _A lot._ I’ll eat the cooked parts. But that’s it.”

Reid stabbed at the fingers ineffectually with the pink plastic picnic fork, pausing every now and then to sigh and glare resentfully at the swivel-eyed, psychotic, serial-killing, cannibalistic weirdo. When, after some effort, he had managed to break the fingers up a little, he began to eat.

“You know, it’s funny,” he said. “I was just thinking the other day about the last cannibal that kidnapped me. European. Seriously cultured guy. _Amazing_ cook. Great conversationalist. I mean sometimes you just get tired of being the only genius in the room, you know? It’s just nice to talk to someone on your own level.”

The swivel-eyed, psychotic, serial-killing, cannibalistic weirdo stuck a none-too-clean finger in his right nostril and probed thoughtfully.

“OK,” said Reid, “maybe it’s not quite such a problem for you. But me and this other cannibal, we had a really nice evening. The IT consultant from Seattle was particularly delicious. He’d led a very sedentary life — the IT consultant I mean, not the cannibal — so he was super-tender and juicy. Apparently he’d lived mostly on Vietnamese take-away which had given the flesh a kind of…” Reid made looping gestures with his pink plastic picnic fork while he searched for the right word, “…piquancy, which the cannibal brought out really well in the spicing of the sauce.” He shook his head in awe. “Brilliant. Easily the best meal I had last year. And, I’ll tell you what else, that cannibal had proper cutlery. _And_ linen napkins that coordinated with the dinnerware. _And_ flowers on the table. _And_ he matched different wines to the different victims. Look, I’m not trying to be rude, but you could have made a bit more of an effort. That’s all I’m saying. Then, for dessert this other cannibal had done a mille-feuille with caramelised heirloom apples and vanilla crème anglaise. Looked _fabulous_. But — wouldn’t you just know it? — the rest of the team had to burst in, all rescue-y and we’re-here-to-save-you! Yeah. Great. Thanks for that, guys. And then Hotch wouldn’t let me eat the dessert and cheese. Said it was evidence. I told him cheese isn’t evidence; it’s just… cheese. Stupid, hide-bound FBI-mindset…”

Reid pointed the pink plastic picnic fork at the swivel-eyed, psychotic, serial-killing, cannibalistic weirdo and narrowed his eyes. “You, on the other hand, I can’t wait to get rescued from. Stockholm syndrome? Believe me, soo-ooo not happening here.”

They stared at each other a long moment.

“Oh, please,” said Reid. “Don’t give me the big, sad eyes. It’s your own fault.”


End file.
